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Donny breathed out of his nose. One, two, three. His legs were still shaking.

Nothin' wrong about it.

You fuckin' crazy? Someone will hear.

Donny, calm the fuck down. Quit being so paranoid.

He had been paranoid. Aldo had assumed he meant the other men would hear or, worse, spot them; he had been half right, of course. But Stiglitz's words had haunted him, and as they had scoured for the most secluded area they could, the fear of discovery by Krauts loomed.

I am calm, Aldo, you're the one gettin' me all riled up-

That's the point, Donny boy. Now keep yer mouth shut for a minute, would ya?

Later, Donny would feel slightly guilty for the fact that they had made their watch duties to something much more personal and intimate. Shit, what if the guys got shot or something? He was their sergeant, Aldo their lieutenant. What they were doing was, technically, irresponsible.

But he couldn't deny what they did had been time well spent.

Afterwords, they didn't lay in each other's arms or talk to each other. They had helped each other dress, the scents of sex and smoke lingering on their bodies. Aldo had initiated their last kiss for that night, not nearly so aggressive as he had been earlier, as he slung Donny's rifle over his back.

Aldo had grunted things to Donny that would make even him, the Bear Jew, want to blush in a normal situation. It was not so much the nature of the words that bothered the young man as it was what it revealed. Donny reminded himself this was a war, and there was not a lot else to think about aside from survival and who you were going to kill next. Perhaps this was why he found it strange that Aldo had thought about him, wanted him, even, for weeks now. He thought back to the past weeks- he had first wounded his leg three weeks ago now. Did it start then, when Aldo had peeled away the fabric of his pants under the guise of replacing the bindings?

Or had it been earlier than that, when Aldo proposed a truce, that they were even? He had taken Donny's Garand that day despite the fact that he had no use for it. Yes, the Bear Jew decided, it must have been then.

As he felt Aldo's hand rest on his collarbone, another thought struck him- what about him? He felt Aldo's tongue press gently against his own and pushed the thought away. Shit, what did that matter? Pop always said to stay in the present and leave old ghosts alone. Maybe the old man had been right for once.

The Bostonian found himself distancing himself from Stiglitz, from Omar, from Utivich. He didn't need them, after all. Their conversations at breakfast were awkward when Donny was around, what with Stiglitz staring at him with that cold look in his eyes.

Aldo was a good actor. He evaded each of Stiglitz's rigorous questions with success, with the mere use of a smile or joke or offer of a cigarette. Donny was growing to resent him despite their friendship; his growing need to understand exactly what was going on between Aldo and himself. He was sure that Stiglitz knew what they did, regardless of whether or not they had watch during the night. Shit, the guy seemed to know everything.

The closer they came to the village, however, the more fleeting their nights became; Aldo too had come to realize the danger they placed themselves in. It didn't stop the stares, the random touches, the words murmured into his ear.

Donny found he had become much more brutal with the Krauts he killed. Part was hatred, the need to see them suffer for what they did, the sick enjoyment it brought him. He was overwhelmed, became someone entirely different- a guy with no morals, no brain, nothing. All he could think of was revenge.

Mostly, he just wanted to please Aldo. He wanted to hear his lieutenant's applause above the jeers and laughter of the others, wanted to see him nod and walk up to the body, insult it. He wanted the praise he received for how many scalps he had collected.

Donny craved the approval of his lieutenant more than anything else. He craved the man's touch, the marks Aldo's fingers made in the blood sprayed across his face and neck and chest. It was a sick obsession on Aldo's part, but this was war; so didn't that forgive everything Aldo did to him? Didn't that make up for the bruises on his thighs, the scratches on his back?

He wondered one night, sitting with Omar on watch, if this war would ever end. And if it did, would he go back to Boston, leaving the ghost of the Bear Jew somewhere in France? Would Aldo come with him? Or would life return to normalcy, their affairs never spoken of unless it was in the dingy bars of restaurants- "Remember the Basterds"?

It made Donny shudder. Better not to think of this war ending, better to think of the whole damn world falling apart before this storm ever blew over. He couldn't go back to Boston, couldn't separate the Bear Jew from little Donny Donowitz, the faithful baseball player, son of the owner of the deli in good old Bean Town.

He couldn't go back without Aldo the Apache.